Actress using personal tragedy to teach kids fire safety

Published: Friday, February 01, 2008

MEGAN K. SCOTT

Four years ago, actress Marcia Gay Harden suffered an unspeakable tragedy: her 6-year-old nephew and 10-year-old niece and their mother were killed in an apartment fire started by an unattended candle.

Marcia Gay Harden appears at the Liberty Mutual "Where's the Fire?" exhibit at Innoventions at Disney World's Epcot in Florida. Harden's nephew, niece and their mother were killed in a fire started by a candle.

Now the Academy Award winner and mother of three is working to help prevent more deaths by appearing in a video on a new fire safety Web site, befiresmart.com, produced by Liberty Mutual.

During 2005, there were an estimated 15,600 home fires started by candles, according to the National Fire Protection Association, resulting in 150 deaths, 1,270 injuries and $539 million property loss.

Here are some excerpts of an interview with Harden:

Q: What have you learned about fires through your work with Liberty Mutual?

A: How prevalent they are, how avoidable they are. Over the holidays, it's things like candles being put to near a tree, or candles being put near a source. Maybe someone opens a door and a paper blows and it can catch, or a curtain can catch if you put it on a window sill ...We walk out the room and think, Oh I'll just be back in a second,' and then something occurs' and you're gone for a while. If there was a wake up, it was to never, ever take a chance like that.

Q: How can parents talk to their children about fires?

A: There're books. There's the Web site (www.befiresmart.com). For the little kids, we're going to be saying, Don't touch the stove, it's hot. Never go near the fire.' For me, it was more age 5, was when we had begun talking to Eulala (her daughter) about some fire safety things. The other key is, too, if God forbid one were caught in a situation, to reduce panic so that you can think calmly about what you need to be doing in that moment. People forget about stay low. People forget that you don't call 911 from inside the house.

In a panic, I forget everything. If it's drilled into you, you don't. The drill takes over. The routine takes over because you know it deeply.

Q: What don't people understand about fires?

A: I think people don't understand how quickly it spreads. I think people think if you call 911 and it took them five minutes, three minutes whatever, to respond, that you would be OK. I don't know how fast it takes for smoke to actually kill you, but it's pretty fast. People think if we just wait here, we'll be safe.

If it's something that seems beyond an immediate fix, you don't go running around looking for the phone. You get out.

You get your kids out and then you dial 911. Better for you to be out and lose items than lose lives.